Every Paul Thomas Anderson Film, Ranked
In 1993, a 23-year-old Paul Thomas Anderson submitted his short film, Cigarettes & Coffee, to the Sundance Film Festival, and unwittingly changed modern cinema. Before he was 30, Anderson had made three beloved feature films—Hard Eight, Boogie Nights and Magnolia—and had already secured his spot as one one of the great contemporary American directors. Now, he’s got nine films under his belt, each more singular and masterfully constructed than the last. Anderson’s films, largely character studies rooted in his own San Fernando, are defined by their luminous cinematography, recurring powerhouse performances by revered actors like Philip Seymour Hoffman, Daniel Day-Lewis and Julianne Moore, inimitable scores by Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood, and idiosyncratic, unexpected subjects.
Anderson’s new film, Licorice Pizza, knocked us out. The film sees Anderson returning to his Californian roots: A tender character study with an ensemble cast, our critic calls it “a delectable, playful, sentimental reminder of what it means to be young, as well as an embodiment of what it feels like to grow up.”
Unsurprisingly, Licorice Pizza lives up to our exceptionally high standards for the auteur. Given this, we saw it high-time to do a comprehensive ranking of every Paul Thomas Anderson film to date—from great to greatest.
Here are all the movies by Paul Thomas Anderson, ranked:
9. Hard Eight (1996)
It’s hard to think of a director who came onto the film scene with a louder bang than Paul Thomas Anderson. His feature debut Hard Eight arose after his 1993 short film, Cigarettes & Coffee, made a splash at the Sundance Film Festival Shorts Program. This led the Sundance Institute to invite him to a Directors Lab, where he would develop a feature film: Hard Eight. Because this is the film biz, development did not come without its fair share of headaches. Anderson shot the film in 28 days, but the studio he paired up with didn’t like his cut, and it took a year of arguments before it was finally released. The struggle was worth it, though, as Anderson’s finished product is whip-smart and engrossing. The film follows Sydney (Philip Baker Hall), an old man who takes the hapless John (John C. Reilly) under his wing and teaches him how to be a successful gambler. The two get mixed up with cocktail waitress/sex worker Clementine (Gwyneth Paltrow), who, in turn, gets them mixed up with a precarious hostage situation. Hard Eight traverses the difficult terrain of keeping a crime-heist film fun without having it verge into camp. The film successfully remains a moving, insightful character study—while still not sacrificing moments of thrilling action—all the way through. And though at times the editing is awkward and performances are a little stiff, it still often seems like the work of a veteran in the director’s chair. It’s hard to believe that Anderson was only twenty-five when he made it.—Aurora Amidon
8. Inherent Vice (2014)
The fog that envelops Inherent Vice might bring to mind the old expression “thick as pea soup.” But that’s not quite right. Sometimes it’s like cotton candy, at others like ominous smoke. Paul Thomas Anderson’s drug-fueled detective odyssey depicts the end of the 1960s in a way that’s both mournful and madcap; coherency isn’t a priority—or even intended—in this tale of an era of endless possibilities coming to a close. Anderson’s adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s 2009 novel is both unnervingly surreal and pliably, affably keen to take every detour possible on the road from A to B. While its gags are ingenious and plentiful, heady themes rise from the madness: Some good for laughs—the culture war is at the forefront of the story, and Anderson isn’t beneath milking a chocolate-covered banana’s phallic qualities as a hippie-hating authority figure devours it—and some, sometimes the very same themes, conjure up a distinct melancholy in the same breath, as in how the ideal of free love gives way to disturbing sexual dynamics.—Jeremy Mathews
7. Punch-Drunk Love (2002)
It may be hard to recall, but there was once a time when the world believed in Adam Sandler—and we have P.T. Anderson to thank for such a glimpse of hope. Compared to the scope of There Will Be Blood, or the melancholy of Boogie Nights, or the inexorable fascination at the heart of The Master, Punch-Drunk Love—a breath of fresh, Technicolor air after the weight of Magnolia—comes off like something of a lark for Anderson, setting the stage for the kind of incisive comic chops the director would later epitomize with Inherent Vice. But far from a bit of fluff or a reactionary stab at a larger audience, Punch-Drunk Love is what happens when a director with so much untapped potential just sort of throws shit at the wall to see what sticks. A simple love story between a squirmy milquetoast (Sandler) and the woman (Emily Watson) who yanks him from his stark blue shell, the film is part musical, part silent film and all surreal comedy. That this is Sandler’s best role is hardly up for debate; that this may be Jon Brion’s best soundtrack is something we can talk about later. That the rest of the film, which in any other director’s hands would be a total mess, feels so exquisitely felt is almost … magical. And that? That’s that, Mattress Man. —Dom Sinacola
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